Back in the Late 80's early 90's when I first started to play, I worked at a small town sporting goods store and set up an account with Doug and Rick, the original owners of National Paintball Supply located in South Carlolina. These two guys were the best. They started to expand the business and in the early to mid 90's Gino came into the picture with the NJ wharehouse. Doug and Rick told me because of my location (MA) I'd have to start ordering from Gino in NJ. After a few months of dealing with Gino, I called Doug and Rick back and told them I refused to deal with Gino, and all my future orders were made directly to SC. Gino is bad for paintball.

I wonder what would happen if NPS died... I mean, they control patents for such a large number of things... Would they collect royalties, or would their subsidiary companies (Halo, Empire, etc.) disappear aswell? That'd certainly throw the industry off balance.

Without Empire, I would be sad. 85% of my gear is Empire.

I don't think Empire and Oddesy, and the other NPS subsidary companies would die... I am pretty sure they would just branch out to another distributer.